Thursday, March 23, 2017

"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes,
exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not
commit suicide."John
Adams

John Adams words are prescient for what is
transpiring in America today. I understand that people are genuinely scared of Trump and while some of those fears
are nonsensical, like comparing him with Hitler, others are genuine and based
on his own words, bombastic tweets and wildly erratic behaviour. Yet, despite
these realities we cannot ignore the fact that he is still the democratically
and freely elected President of the United States of America.

For all the never Trumpers, it is important to remember that our system
of checks and balances is designed to withstand the shock of rogue actors (not
to prevent one from being elected) and we must put our faith in democracy to
curtail Trump whenever he strays, but never break rules to fight him; or we
will just play into his hands and prove his refrain that the rules are changed
when liberals do not get the outcomes they desire.

So it is really important that no matter what
people think of him personally, or how much they fear his actions, that we
never circumvent due process, bypass checks and balances or colour outside the
lines of democracy (especially when he does) in a bid to foil him, because our actions will have grave
consequences and weaken our democracy for the long-term.

At the moment, I am seeing four dangerous trends,
behaviours and precedents being adopted by the Democratic Party and the so
called liberal “resistance” to Trump, and they must stop. The end result of
continuing down these paths damages our democracy far more than any errant
President can in four years.

One: Rogue Government Employees

When the parks department sent out a tweet showing
larger crowds at Obama’s historic inauguration in 2008 versus Trump’s in 2017,
most people viewed this as an innocuous act or laughed at Trump’s expense.
However, what was at issue was not a single errant tweet but that of breaking a
sacred rule – one where a government agencies should never show a partisan face
in public. In the days after, we saw a slew of rogue twitter accounts springing
up from within government agencies, from the EPA to NASA, that were clearly
designed to humiliate Trump’s administration. The problem with this behaviour
is that it compromises the integrity of each agency for the long-term by
putting a doubt in people’s minds about government
employees' abilities to do their jobs, irrespective
of which party is in power.

Second, the manner in which Sally Yates (the acting
Attorney General) acted was also wrong. First, let me be clear that I
fully agree with Ms. Yates stance against President Trump’s ill-conceived
travel ban, but my issue is the way in which she took action. The professional thing for her to do would have
been to resign.

She had every right to protest the order by
resigning, but it was wrong for her to refuse to fulfil her job
responsibilities. By doing this, and even more worryingly, by ordering her
subordinates not to do their jobs, she signaled to all Justice
department staff that they too are free to disobey direct orders based on
personal or partisan whims, rather than expected to always act in a professional manner and
follow protocols.

We must consider the flip-side of government employees taking unilateral
actions that disobey direct orders. For the short period that President Trump’s
travel ban was in effect, there were numerous reports of US Customs agents
harassing and detaining people that were not covered under the order. Like Ms.
Yates did, these men and women might also justify their unprofessional
behaviour and rule breaking as a moral obligation to protect the nation and
keep all Americans safe.

We also saw a senior Secret Service agent publicly post that she did not want to take a
bullet for the President because she supported Hillary Clinton. Imagine what would happen if police across the
country started to behave in the same manner (the majority of local law
enforcement supported Trump) and decided that they do not want to intervene
when a riot broke out in a Democrat leaning district; this is a very slippery
slope. Government employees going rogue, acting
insubordinately and refusing to do their jobs, rather than using proper and professional protocols of redress must never be
excused or condoned on either side.

Two: Loss of Credibility of the Fourth Estate

There is little doubt after the last election that
the majority of the mainstream media skews liberal and favours democrats. We
can argue this but all you need do is look at the sources all liberals use to
make their arguments on social media and you will find the usual suspects.

That there is some bias in the media is not an
issue; all publications lean one way or another. The issue arises when
respectable mainstream media outlets go out of their way to play judge and jury, and do it through a blindly
partisan and subjective lens. This is NOT the job of the media. We
rely on them to hold a mirror up to society by reporting the facts, and to do
so objectively after taking the time to verify
the credibility of their sources.

At the moment, we have a new leak from deep within
the government almost every day. These leaks are suspiciously designed to embarrass Trump’s
administration or target a particular official within it, and all conveniently
cite ‘unnamed sources’. I am not defending Trump or his combative relationship
with the media, but no matter how a President
behaves, it is still the duty of the fourth estate to rise above
juvenile and vindictive behaviour and to fairly and
accurately investigate, find and follow the facts of every story. This is the
only way the media can start to regain their
credibility and, more importantly, hold the President accountable for all his actions.
Otherwise they will continue to be seen by a growing majority as part of the
rigged and corrupt system that Trump says they are.

While there is no question that sites like Fox news
and MSNBC are heavily biased and driven by political agendas, at least the
majority of Americans trusted venerable institutions like the New York Times
and Wall Street Journal because they upheld basic ethical standards in their
reporting. Now these institutions are further eroding the scant trust Americans
have in them by behaving like hysterical children. If they don’t start doing
their jobs and once more act as the credible bridge for both sides by focusing
on and ascertaining all the facts, they will be responsible for destroying a
crucial check and balance and seriously weakening our democracy.

Three: Abuse of State Apparatus

If you followed the sequence of events that led to
the resignation of Michael Flynn, the facts clearly show that someone high up
in the government leaked highly classified information to the Washington Post. The Post first published the article about Flynn possibly being
compromised based on a “… call and subsequent intercepts, FBI agents wrote
a secret report summarizing ­Flynn’s discussions with Kislyak.”

As it turns out Flynn did not break any law and the FBI has confirmed
that they don't
believe Flynn intentionally misled them during an interview last monthand they are not
going to press charges. So it would seem that the media furore that led to Mr. Flynn’s resignation was an orchestrated
political assassination from people within the government,
who selectively leaked highly sensitive information. I am not defending Flynn
- he lied and was rightly fired by the President.
The point is that again this is a line that should
never have been crossed. Once state power is abused and targets individuals,
for purely political reasons, there is nothing stopping opponents from doing
the same when the tables are turned.

Four: Democrat’s Blind Obstruction vs. Debating Issues

Democrats
seem to have a short memory. Until recently they were
decrying the Republican Party’s obstructionism during Obama’s tenure and now
they are doing exactly the same with Trump. I encourage and expect both sides
to challenge every President’s nominees, but it is wrong to attack anyone’s
character; as Elizabeth Warren did with Jeff Sessions (and was rightly censured
for doing so). I am not a supporter of Mr. Sessions, but Ms. Warren lost my sympathies and respect when she mounted a
personal and subjective attack, rather than go after Mr. Session’s record and
actions during his tenure in office. There is no excuse for such behaviour;
this is the United States Senate, not third grade.

I was equally vehement when the likes of Ted Cruz and Bobby Jindal
attacked Obama personally, rather than his record and failed to address policy
disagreements with him. John McCain is the only politician in recent times that
showed character in refusing to let a woman at his rally personally attack
Obama, when running against him in 2008. There can be no room for public personal
attacks in politics; it only lowers the standard of discourse, leads everyone
into the gutter and ensures that all Americans lose.

Thanks to Democrats, we are now left with a lopsided rule that hacks
democracy and allows any party, with a simple majority, to advance their picks
without sufficient debate. Such measures are short-sighted and only weaken
democracy by removing safeguards designed to protect it.

Finally, the Democrats would do well to remember that “obstructing”
is not a winning strategy. The GOP learnt this lesson only after the total
annihilation of their party; one that ended with a hostile takeover by Donald
Trump. Democrats need to win voters based on the strength of their ideas and
not blind obstruction. And this is the only way to succeed because unlike Communism, Capitalism is about
ideas, not ideology. If Democrats do not heed this warning, they will suffer
the same fate as the GOP did after George W. Bush.

The bottom line is that no matter how people feel about Trump, the
election is over, and they have no choice but to abide by the results and live
with the consequences for the next four years. That is democracy and there are
no exceptions;
otherwise, we must stop calling ourselves a
democratic society.

For all those who believe that Trump is evil and must be removed from
office, they are entitled to their views, but have only two options to get rid
of him, one entirely out of their hands. They can vote him out of office in
four years and use the mid-terms in two years to elect Democrats
to both houses that can curtail his power and stall his legislative agenda.

The other is to wait for Trump to commit a crime that leads to his
impeachment and subsequent removal from office; Clinton was impeached but this
does not automatically lead to removal from office. There is no other way to
get rid of a democratically elected President that does not involve a military coup, which is never good for democracy.

This does not mean we need to rollover and accept everything the
President does, or not fight back when his administration strays. We must hold every President to task like we did with
Watergate, the Iraq War, domestic surveillance overreach, etc. However,
respecting our democracy also means we never
simply get to remove a President because we find him distasteful or vehemently
disagree with his views – that is anarchy.